


Fears That Ever Flickered

by evol_love



Category: Spring Awakening - Sheik/Sater
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Implied/Referenced Suicide, inspired by/set in tumblr user gloryofspring's The Guilty One's au verse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-03
Updated: 2016-08-03
Packaged: 2018-07-29 04:12:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,050
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7669621
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/evol_love/pseuds/evol_love
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After Moritz's death, Ilse meets up with Melchior to tell him about Moritz's last words to her, and in turn , they share each other's grief.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fears That Ever Flickered

**Author's Note:**

> I literally wrote this in about two hours because I have been thinking about these characters and this interaction ever since Miriam posted the Moritz's suicide section of the TGO AU. I'm not sure why it hit me so hard, since I'm familiar with the show and with Moritz's death, but for whatever reason it impacted me a lot harder than usual, and I've been unable to stop thinking about it. 
> 
> If you haven't read TGO AU on tumblr, this will probably still be readable but some things won't be explained that well, and I HIGHLY recommend you check out the original posts at http://gloryofspring.tumblr.com/tagged/tgo-au. They're breathtaking, and done in social media posts rather than text so it's a super fast read through, and well worth it.
> 
> Title from "Left Behind" from Spring Awakening.

Ilse debates not saying anything, but the last thing she needs is some added guilt on her conscience, a little more fear of haunting, additional nightmares where Moritz is right there and she still doesn’t save him in time. She shoots him a message on Facebook telling him to meet her at the park near her apartment (she doesn’t want to compromise Hanschen and Martha by having him at the apartment itself) and doesn’t wait for his reply before driving there, sitting on the hood of her car where she’s parked. Even in the middle of the day, it’s quiet there. Melchior pulls up fifteen minutes later, looking like he hasn’t slept in days.

“You look terrible,” she tells him, but her tone isn’t unkind. He pauses in front of her car until she nods, gesturing for him to join her, and he climbs onto the hood beside her.

“I’ve felt better,” he agrees. He’s been crying. She considers that this is a mistake, that maybe telling him is just ridding herself of guilt and pinning it to someone else. Here, it’s your problem now, I have enough on my plate. 

She swallows. No. Moritz asked her to do this. She owes this much to him, at least. 

“How are you holding up?”

“Not great. How are you holding up?”

“Not great.”

They’re quiet. 

“You can talk, if you need to,” Ilse tells him. She wonders if anyone has even been listening to him, or if they’ve just been telling him it’s all okay, that it’s all going to be okay, that there’s one more angel in heaven. Ilse hates that shit, knows that Melchior feels the same. 

“I don’t even know anymore. Being alone is horrible. Being with my parents is horrible. Being with anyone just feels empty, because he should be there and he isn’t, it’s like a hole got punched in my life and I don’t know how to fix it. And I just, I hate it and I hate myself because all I can think about is how I wish it had been me.”

“Don’t say that. You know he wouldn’t want that. He wouldn’t want you dead.”

“Do you think I want him dead?” Melchior looks a bit crazed, hair disheveled and eyes red. 

“Melchior,” Ilse hesitates. “Melchior, you should know. When he was texting me, that night. He asked me to tell you—”

“Don’t, Ilse, please,” Melchior begs, voice hoarse. “Don’t do this to me. I don’t want to know, it’s not fair.”

“You’re a fucking coward, Melchior Gabor,” Ilse says, sympathy leaving her as quickly as it came. “Moritz loved you Melchior. He loved you. Did you really never notice?” She’s poisoning Moritz’s words, and this isn’t how it’s supposed to be, but her grief keeps rearing its ugly head in unexpected, unpredictable ways. Maybe that was Moritz’s final wish after all, to create a monster in his wake. 

“Why are you doing this to me?” Melchior’s crying now, and some savage part of Ilse is glad. She wants to rip him open, leave him raw like she’s been. She suspects, though, that he already has been. That he’s already picked apart at the seams, ready to fall to pieces at any moment. 

“It was the last thing he asked of me, Melchior. I can’t just leave it. It’s. It’s not about you.” Her confidence is waning. 

“It’s about him,” Melchior agrees softly. He swipes his arm across his eyes. “God. This is so fucked.”

“Totally fucked,” Ilse agrees. 

“Can I tell you something?” Ilse nods. “I’ve been torturing myself over why he didn’t call me. Why didn’t he call me, Ilse? He knows he could have called me, I would have answered, if he’d just told me, fuck,” Melchior cuts off abruptly, throat tight. 

“You can’t think like that,” Ilse says, shaking her head. “He’d—he’d already made up his mind, Melchior. He was going to do it.”

“I just wish I had known,” he says. “How did I not notice he was that far gone? How could I have been that blind?”

“We can’t blame ourselves for this. I mean, shit, if I let myself think like that...Melchior if I hadn’t been so pissed at him for blowing me off, if I had texted him back sooner, called him, anything,” her voice breaks, and Melchior realizes she’s shaking. 

“Do you...what do you...do you need a hug?” he asks, panicking. He’s bad at people crying. Bad at people, maybe. 

Ilse shakes her head sharply. “No. Don’t touch me. Just—just give me a minute.”

He nods, but has no idea what to do with his hands hanging mindlessly at his sides, fingers itching to reassure. He stuffs them in his pockets for lack of any better ideas, looking down at his knees and cursing himself for being so unable to help anyone around him, even now. 

“It’s not right,” Ilse gasps finally, and she’s crying hard enough now that it starts Melchior up again. “It’s not right, and no one can ever ever make it right again.” She dabs at her eyes, and Melchior can at least help here, as he fishes out one of the Kleenexes in his pocket for her. He’s taken to carrying them with him at this point because Moritz is everywhere, everywhere, everywhere. “I just can’t stop rereading those last texts, even when I’m asleep they’re running through my mind. Why wouldn’t he let me help him?”

Melchior takes a deep breath. “‘S like you said. He made his mind up.” Melchior looks up at the sky. The sunshine feels like betrayal. 

“Are you safe?” she asks bluntly, frowning at him. “Don’t bullshit me. I’ve seen enough in my life to know when people are bullshitting about being okay.”

“No,” Melchior says. “I’m not okay, I’m just...I don’t know. I’m confused.And sad, and I’m so fucking _angry_ that sometimes I forget how sad I am, I think if I see Moritz’s dad any time soon I might kill him. I honestly don’t know if I could stop myself.”

“You know it’s okay to feel that way, right? I mean, I’m not exactly the picture of mental health, but don’t beat yourself up for feeling like shit. You’re allowed to feel like shit. We all feel like shit.”

He’s suspiciously silent.

“Melchior.”

“Thanks. I haven’t—I haven’t really been talking to people. Nobody gets it, nobody understands how ugly and twisted up it all is my brain and everyone just wants to give me their damn condolences and I’m not the one who died. I’m the one who got left behind.”

“And you already know how ugly and twisted up _my_ brain is,” she says, not quite a joke but on its way to being one. 

“I didn’t mean it like that.”

“I know you didn’t.” She sighs. “I’m sorry I told you like that. You deserved to hear it differently. Frankly I didn’t think it was fair at all, but, you know. Moritz wanted you to know.”

“I’m so stupid.”

“Hey, no, stop.”

“Well I am,” he protests.

“You two should have talked. You should have talked about it.”

“I was so distracted by Wendla, I was so excited she was back in our world that I just pushed him aside until I was ready to use him again and that sucks. More than anything, that sucks. I should have been paying attention, and I didn’t, and now he’s gone and I can’t take it back.”

“Look, you’re going to drive yourself crazy with the should have’s, okay? I know. I’ve been doing it too.” She puts a hand on his shoulder hesitantly. “He loved—he loves you. I know he forgives you.” 

Melchior nods, restrained, and she can see him beginning to bottle himself up again. She wonders if this is what she looks like to other people. 

“How’s Wendla?” Melchior shrugs in response. 

“I haven’t really been talking to her. I don’t know. I feel like I’m supposed to talk to her about it but I don’t even know where to start. She’ll just look at me with those eyes and feel sorry for me and it will be my fault all over again.”

“I get it. I do. But you should try, okay? Maybe tell her you need some space right now, that you’re working through stuff? She’ll understand. I know she will.”

“You’re probably right. I can’t even begin to think about like, being with her anymore. It’s like all the stuff that was going on before all of this has just evaporated. I don’t know who I am or what I’m doing, or anything. I sort of just want everyone to leave me alone.”

She knocks her knees against his, and says, “Well, if you’ll consider taking me off your ban on social interaction, you can always call me. Or just show up at my apartment, whatever. I’ll send you the address, just text me before you come.”

“You should delete those texts.”

“What?”

“The ones from Moritz...if they’re hurting you that much that you’re having nightmares. You should get rid of them.”

Ilse shakes her head. “Those are his last words Melchior, I can’t just erase them.”

“He wouldn’t want you making yourself unhappy over them. You’ve done what he wanted you to, right? You’ve helped him as much as you can.” She nods. “So help you now.”

She considers this. “Maybe tomorrow,” she tells him, and they both know it’s the best either of them can do.

“I should go,” he tells her, starting to climb off the car. “Ilse?”

“Yeah?”

“Thanks.”

She gives him a sad smile. “I’m sorry.”

“I know.” He unlocks his car and is about to get in before biting his lip and adding, “I might take you up on that, by the way. If your offer of your apartment is still open.”

She nods, “Of course.” 

“I want to be alone, but i don’t know if i know how to be alone anymore. Maybe being alone in some else’s house will help.”

“Worth a shot,” she agrees. She swipes one more time at her eyes as Melchior pulls away, and he’s not okay, he’s not at all fucking okay, he’s probably going to do something reckless and catastrophic in the next few days or weeks that sends them all into a tailspin, but for now he’s a boy and his best friend is dead and no one can give him back. But Ilse thinks maybe, maybe they can lean on each other. All of them, Wendla and Georg and Ernst and Martha and Hanschen, Thea and Max and Hanschen and Melitta and even Bobby, whose post on Moritz’s wall upon hearing the news was surprisingly heartfelt and moving. They can help each other heal, even if it isn’t something they can fix at all. 

She texts her groupchat with Martha and Hanschen to ask them what they want for dinner, and is about to drive to the grocery store when she sees Melchior has barely made it a block and has pulled over on the side of the road. 

She shoots the groupchat another quick text, then pulls up next to him, rolling down her window.

“Hey,” she yells, and he looks up, rolling down his window quickly. 

“Sorry, sorry, I’m fine,” he says, but it’s such a bad lie she doesn’t even acknowledge it. 

“You’re coming home with me for dinner, okay? I’m going to the store now, follow me.” He nods, wiping his eyes and rolling the window back up. She glances into her rearview mirror to make sure he actually is following her, smiling when she sees he is.

Ilse cannot fix everything, or everyone. She’s not even supposed to. Ilse Neumann was not made for the purpose of fixing everyone else’s life. It's easier to remember that some days than others, but it holds true nonetheless. She's working on it. 

Not everyone can be saved. Not everyone _wants_ to be saved, even. But she can help people, can take everything that she’s put behind her now and use it to tell the other people in her life that they are not alone and hurting in solitude on this earth.

And maybe that can be enough.

**Author's Note:**

> Cry about Spring Awakening and other musicals with me at nonbinarycharliedalton.tumblr.com
> 
> Again, credit for this verse goes to tumblr user gloryofspring and their tgo au.


End file.
